Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 01.pdf/581

 530

took the liberty of shouting to prevent his falling asleep again. The cottage looked so comfortable when its light fell through the open door across my dark path, that for the moment I considered that grumbling tollkeeper with his lantern the most enviable man in the world. I would fain have held some parley with him, the situation was so lonely and depressing. But he had not de voted his leisure to dressing, whatever he did with it; his attire was scanty, and the "nipping and eager air" made him anxious to return to his couch. He opened the gates, let me pass through, took my money, shone his lantern into my face, grunted a brief meteorological remark, shut the gates again, went in and banged his door. Di ogenes ought to have kept a toll. The good old institution of tolls has recently passed away into the historical past. What has be come of the toll-keepers, I have not been able in a single instance to discover. The houses now deal in sherbet and cooling non-alcoholic beverages for 'Arry on Kis Sunday afternoon walks. But whither have the keepers vanished? They were a class of men unique and by themselves; inca pable, I should think, from their souredness and specialty training of betaking them selves to any other occupation. No Act of Parliament could adequately compensate them for its interference with their vested rights. And now the toll-gates were closed behind me! I felt more than ever desolate and de jected, regarding the gates as an insuperable barrier between me and all the known and wholesome world. I drove on doggedly. The snow drifted against me, covering my coat and every surface presented to the blast with its white and chilly flakes. Mile after mile passed, the road becoming, if possible, darker and drearier. We crossed the bridge which spans our broad and tossing river. The flood, black and ice-edged, was most hideous to look at intelligently at such a time; for to look at it intelligently meant ghastly suggestions, ghastly fears, and ghast

ly impulses. Next, we toiled our weary way up a long and steep incline, shut in on either side by a dense wood. That much I could see in spite of the dark. While the horse trudged along at the slowest of equestrian walking paces through the deep snow, stop ping at short intervals to breathe himself, my mental state was rendered still more dis tressing by my now realizing for the first time that I had left my house, left my town, without giving a hint to my domestics as to where I was going or that I was going any where! Vivid visions now haunted me of their consternation in the morning, when after repeated calls unanswered, they should enter my room at length, and find it vacant! Then the news would spread. My friends would meet each other; they would com pare notes, and form conjectures, and com pile an elaborate explanatory story. And as they exchanged their Christmas greet ings, they would discuss the news, and say how sad it was about S, poor fellow, going home, just a little elevated, missed his way, fell into the river, etc., etc. Or, per haps, some more charitable people would shake their heads and hint darkly at diffi culties, clients' funds, absconding! I knew that the stable people would be late in the day in throwing their light on the subject. That light would be more than doubtful, except, indeed, in the direction of confirm ing the absconding theory. Altogether, these reflections and imaginings were most comfortable. Nevertheless, they had their good effect. I brooded less intently on every trying circumstance about me. I felt less sensitively the depressing character of my situation. When thus absorbed in my reflections, I was startled by my horse stopping abruptly and beginning to tremble violently all over. Glaring at me wildly, fiercely, fixedly, and most brilliantly, — placed just ahead of him, — were a pair of the most horrible eyes I ever saw. Positively I shook with terror, as violently as my horse. When I met their gaze, I could not withdraw mine. I